To improve the understanding of high-latitude rain microphysics and its implications for the remote sensing of rainfall by ground-based and spaceborne radars, raindrop size measurements have been analyzed that were collected over five years with a Joss–Waldvogel disdrometer located in Järvenpää, Finland. The analysis shows that the regional climate is characterized by light rain and small drop size with narrow size distributions and that the mutual relations of drop size distribution parameters differ from those reported at lower latitudes. Radar parameters computed from the distributions demonstrate that the high latitudes are a challenging target for weather radar observations, particularly those employing polarimetric and dual-frequency techniques. Nevertheless, the findings imply that polarimetric ground radars can produce reliable “ground truth” estimates for space observations and identify dual-frequency radars utilizing a W-band channel as promising tools for observing rainfall in the high-latitude climate.

Abstract–In this study, we conduct a detailed analysis of the Košice meteorite fall (February28, 2010), to derive a reliable law describing the mass distribution among the recovered fragments. In total, 218 fragments of the Košice meteorite, with a total mass of 11.285 kg, were analyzed. Bimodal Weibull, bimodal Grady, and bimodal lognormal distributions are found to be the most appropriate for describing the Košice fragmentation process. Based on the assumption of bimodal lognormal, bimodal Grady, bimodal sequential, and bimodal Weibull fragmentation distributions, we suggest that, prior to further extensive fragmentation in the lower atmosphere, the Košice meteoroid was initially represented by two independent pieces with cumulative residual masses of approximately 2 and 9 kg, respectively. The smaller piece produced about 2 kg of multiple lightweight meteorite fragments with the mean around 12 g. The larger one resulted in 9 kg of meteorite fragments, recovered on the ground, including the two heaviest pieces of 2.374 kg and 2.167 kg with the mean around 140 g. Based on our investigations, we conclude that two to three larger fragments of 500–1000 g each should exist, but were either not recovered or not reported by illegal meteorite hunters.

Two experiments investigated the perception of compound vs. phrasal stress and narrow focus in normally hearing children and children with Cochlear Implants (CI). Additionally, we investigated whether musical experience would predict children’s performance in these tasks. The results showed no difference between CI and normal-hearing (NH) children in either experiment. However, whereas we found no clear effect of age in the children’s stress detection, there was a clear age related trajectory in the ability to recognise (narrow) focus. Moreover, this trend was similar to what has been found previously for English children. Importantly, prior music experience was significantly linked to CI children’s perception of focus.

Current genomic prediction equations, when carried out in multiple populations with admixed structures ignore structure and assume these populations are uniform. The observed reliabilities of direct genomic breeding values (DGV) for unproven bulls in these populations so far have been low. The current study evaluated reliabilities of DGV in selection candidates using multi-trait random regression model which account for interactions between marker effects and breed of origin in the admixed Nordic Red dairy cattle. Our breed-specific model used breed proportions (BP) as random predictors and deregressed proofs of estimated breeding values (DRP) as response variables weighted by approximated reliability of DRP. Reliabilities were explored as squared correlation between DRP and DGV, weighted by the mean reliability of DRP. Estimated reliabilities were low for milk (0.32) and protein (0.32) and slightly higher (0.42) for fat. Observed reliabilities were similar to those estimated assuming homogenous structure. The Nordic Red cattle is admixed but closely related, thus, the model under investigation may have been unable to differentiate additive genetic effects by breed of origin with a medium dense marker data

This study investigated the number and nature of gifted female and male students’ scientific, societal, and moral questions concerning science. The participants (N=658) of this study were 16-19 year-old international students from 55 countries, and two continents, Asia and Europe. They applied to participate in the Millennium Youth Camp held in 2011 in Finland. The students came from scientifically and mathematically oriented schools and they had shown an interest towards science through competitions, school success, and their own research. The students were asked to formulate questions they would like to get answers to during the camp. The nature and number of the students’ questions were analyzed with qualitative and quantitative content analysis. The results showed that the boys asked more scientific questions than the girls, and the girls asked more societal questions than the boys. The students asked less questions about morality than scientific or societal questions. The most common questions about morality were related to pollution and fresh air, environmental problems, and water protection. The results point to the need for teachers to teach socioscientific issues and discuss moral questions related to science. This should be done to increase moral sensitivity and influence the future of humankind.

A visual world eye-tracking study investigated the activation and persistence of implicit causality information in spoken language comprehension. We showed that people infer the implicit causality of verbs as soon as they encounter such verbs in discourse, as is predicted by proponents of the immediate focusing account (Greene & McKoon, 1995; Koornneef & Van Berkum, 2006; Van Berkum, Koornneef, Otten, & Nieuwland, 2007). Interestingly, we observed activation of implicit causality information even before people encountered the causal conjunction. However, while implicit causality information was persistent as the discourse unfolded, it did not have a privileged role as a focusing cue immediately at the ambiguous pronoun when people were resolving its antecedent. Instead, our study indicated that implicit causality does not affect all referents to the same extent, rather it interacts with other cues in the discourse, especially when one of the referents is already prominently in focus.

The activity of glycogen debranching enzyme (GDE) was studied in relation to pH value and temperature in porcine masseter and longissimus dorsi muscles. A glycogen limit dextrin was used as the substrate for GDE, and the enzyme was derived from raw meat extracts. In both muscles, the pH only weakly affected on activity of GDE at the pH values found in carcasses post-slaughter. However, the activity of GDE decreased strongly (P < 0.001) when the temperature decreased from values of 39 °C and 42 °C found just after slaughter to values of 4 °C and 15 °C found during cooling. In both muscles the activity of GDE began to fall at temperatures below 39 °C and was almost zero when the temperature decreased to below 15 °C. Thus, the activity of GDE may control the rate of glycogenolysis and glycolysis, but does not block rapid glycolysis and pH decrease when the temperature is high. This may be important in PSE meat, where the pH decreases rapidly at high temperatures, but rapid cooling could limit the activity of GDE and thus glycogenolysis. As expected, GDE was more active in the light longissimus dorsi muscle than in the dark masseter muscle.

We compute AC electrical transport at quantum Hall critical points, as modeled by intersecting branes and gauge/gravity duality. We compare our results with a previous field theory computation by Sachdev, and find unexpectedly good agreement. We also give general results for DC Hall and longitudinal conductivities valid for a wide class of quantum Hall transitions, as well as (semi)analytical results for AC quantities in special limits. Our results exhibit a surprising degree of universality; for example, we find that the high frequency behavior, including subleading behavior, is identical for our entire class of theories.